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Now, I'm going to make a request... it may be a bit of a stretch... but..

Would anyone be able to provide me a craft that can SSTO anywhere (from an atmosphere, mind), with warp, and the ability to refuel most places? As is, I'm struggling to create a craft that can fly, and that can generate enough power for warp, and has enough stuff to ISRU in atmosphere and on airless bodies. I can't get all of them down. Any help or an example craft would be splendid. I'm only using the IE mod for parts.

I've tried combinations of antimatter reactors with thermal nozzles, areospike zpinch.. The closest I got was using a normal zpinch before it was changed to work poorly in atmospheres, but even then it was a bit underpowered with a trialpha reactor.

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Now, I'm going to make a request... it may be a bit of a stretch... but..

Would anyone be able to provide me a craft that can SSTO anywhere (from an atmosphere, mind), with warp, and the ability to refuel most places? As is, I'm struggling to create a craft that can fly, and that can generate enough power for warp, and has enough stuff to ISRU in atmosphere and on airless bodies. I can't get all of them down. Any help or an example craft would be splendid. I'm only using the IE mod for parts.

I've tried combinations of antimatter reactors with thermal nozzles, areospike zpinch.. The closest I got was using a normal zpinch before it was changed to work poorly in atmospheres, but even then it was a bit underpowered with a trialpha reactor.

Many thanks

I'm pretty burnt out trying to set up my next save, and this sounds like a nice challenge, as I still don't know how most KSPIE stuff works and never got to warp yet. I'll probably try a helium based thermal ramjet based design. Any other constraints you want to put on it? Are you using interstellar fuel switch too?

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Either you are in a sandbox playthrough, or you're much farther along than I am lol. I can get an SSTO in orbit with Magnetized Fusion reactor and a combo of Thermal Turbo/Ramjets. However, I can't get it up with enough DeltaV to really go places once I put the necessary refineries on it for refueling. I just need a few upgrades so I get more bang for my buck out of engines/reactors I think.

Go to my guide and look for beaucoupzero's builds. Slow it down and watch how he builds them.

What would you recommend FreeThinker? An SSTO to anywhere with refinery capability.

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I'm pretty burnt out trying to set up my next save, and this sounds like a nice challenge, as I still don't know how most KSPIE stuff works and never got to warp yet. I'll probably try a helium based thermal ramjet based design. Any other constraints you want to put on it? Are you using interstellar fuel switch too?

I've had success with a non-plane SSTO (though it could be converted to a plane easily enough): plasma nozzle + positron reactor + lots of positrons. I didn't bother with refueling, but the basic structure has enough lift to take all the hardware needed to refine fuel. To make it easier to handle in atmospheres I gave it some small LF tanks. For everything else, a giant H2 tank. I can see if I can dig up a craft file for it later.

This is, however, fairly high tech, so not suitable to an early career build (I used it in mid career).

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It requires IFS Core, which I believe is what allows some tanks to fuel switch in flight. IFS is an optional mod (built on IFSC) that adds more special tanks.

4 minutes ago, mbaryu said:

I've had success with a non-plane SSTO (though it could be converted to a plane easily enough): plasma nozzle + positron reactor + lots of positrons. I didn't bother with refueling, but the basic structure has enough lift to take all the hardware needed to refine fuel. To make it easier to handle in atmospheres I gave it some small LF tanks. For everything else, a giant H2 tank. I can see if I can dig up a craft file for it later.

This is, however, fairly high tech, so not suitable to an early career build (I used it in mid career).

I never got much further than fission reactors, but with those it wasn't too hard to SSTO to anywhere and refuel. I suppose with engame tech it's probably pretty trivial. If you have warp drive you ought to have the rest lol.

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Yes but the fact remains that players apparently expect they can switch to the atmosphere while still in space. I'm thinking about adding a special window which would allow you to switch between propellants and show expected performance (thrust, isp) before you switch.

8 hours ago, mbaryu said:

I've had success with a non-plane SSTO (though it could be converted to a plane easily enough): plasma nozzle + positron reactor + lots of positrons.

1

Notice that for new vessels to achieve the same, you need to replace by positron reactor by the antimatter beam core reactor And replace the positron storage by an antimatter or antihydrogen storage device. This is both more realistic and effective as positron are only really suitable for short burst of high thermal power. This will also solve the storage issue as antimatter can be stored much denser as antihydrogen.

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What would you recommend FreeThinker? An SSTO to anywhere with refinery capability.

When building an SSTO what is important is that you want a vessel with both strong atmosphere launch capability and high isp vacuum capability. Keep in mind that we want to minimize excess mass as much possible and avoid duplicate power systems that end up as dead weight. In general we can make a distinction between SSTO that take off as a plane and speed up in high atmosphere and those that justblow themself into orbit after which you maximise isp or use a secondary high isp engine. I prefer to call the later ones SSTS (Single Stage To Space). SSTS should be equiped with grid fins at the top to allow landing in reverse spaceX style. Although SSTO have higher deltaV requirements to get into space, they don't have to be super streamlined as they don't have to reach super high velovities. Early one on of the ideal engine for SSTS would be a Nuclear Lightbulb, using a dense propellant for launch and hydrogen for space AND LANDING. Notice the last Update has added a feature which allows you to increase the fuel flow rate (at the expense of isp) allowing the Lightbulb up to increase it thrust by 5 times. A neat trick to make SSTS easier is to make use of IFS wrap drop tanks. wrap drop tank are tanks specifically designed to wrap around main fuel tanks, which will can be dropped during launch. Although they technically make your vessel have stages, since you don't throw your expansive engine away, it doesn't really count in my view.

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I've tried combinations of antimatter reactors with thermal nozzles, areospike zpinch.. The closest I got was using a normal zpinch before it was changed to work poorly in atmospheres, but even then it was a bit underpowered with a trialpha reactor.

5

Weird what propellant did you use with the Zpinch? Ideally, use should use at least 2 propellants, one for atmospheric use and one for space. The Z-Pinch Airospike can additionally use atmosphere for during low atmosphere flight, switch to HTP to boost itself into orbit and then use a Mono Atomic (like Hydrogen, Helium, Nitrogen, etc) propellant for Space orbital manoeuvres.

It has a single trialpha reactor and a folding warp drive (I'm not sure if a small drive is any better?). It was a bit underpowered because I couldn't seem to start warp very fast or as often as I would like. But I could land it fairly easliy everywhere.

ISRU, the only thing I at thus point had understood was using a refrigerator for nitrogen. I don't know how to make HTP nor do I know much how to refuel it on airless planets.

----

I've tried to modify this to include the positron reactor, thermal nozzle (I've tried the Krusader and the thermal turbojet), singularity reactor (which I've edited the part file to allow scaling below 5m to fit without being abnormally large) to create positrons, as well as a MHD generator to generate power from the positron reactor (didn't work because of overheating when I try to do much of anything but use the thermal nozzles).

Likewise in the above attempts I've tried to include the positron creator part (without the singularity reactor), even to the point of editing the part file so that it has a net gain of positrons when used with the MHD generator, but still this doesn't accomplish what I want because of overheating when I charge warp.

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ISRU, the only thing I at thus point had understood was using a refrigerator for nitrogen. I don't know how to make HTP nor do I know much how to refuel it on airless planets.

2

HTP is actually real easy to produce with the Anthraquinone process (with the ISRU Fabricator) with a source of hydrogen gas and source of oxygen gas. Alternatively, you use the stock ISRU converter to produce Oxidizer from Ore and convert it into HTP using the IFS Cryotank Oxidizer to HTP converter.

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It has a single trialpha reactor and a folding warp drive (I'm not sure if a small drive is any better?). It was a bit underpowered because I couldn't seem to start warp very fast or as often as I would like.

1

Notice that you can stack Warp Drives. By doubling the warp drive mass it will significantly charge faster and reach higher (and slower sublight) speeds.

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HTP is actually real easy to produce with the Anthraquinone process (with the ISRU Fabricator) with a source of hydrogen gas and source of oxygen gas. Alternatively, you use the stock ISRU converter to produce Oxidizer from Ore and convert it into HTP using the IFS Cryotank Oxidizer to HTP converter.

I will try this the next time I play. Would using the stock mining drill and converter be sufficient, or might it be better to use one of the IE more efficient in any way?

2 minutes ago, FreeThinker said:

Notice that you can stack Warp Drives. By doubling the warp drive mass it will significantly charge faster and reach higher (and slower sublight) speeds.

Does this require more or less power? I imagine that using more than a single warp engine would be cumbersome on a spaceplane.

Likewise, aside from warp mass (which looks like it is 4/8/12), is there any difference between the small/folding/large drive? They are, more or less, small/med/large drives, correct? Folding doesn't do anything the others do not do (aside from have an animation)?

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I will try this the next time I play. Would using the stock mining drill and converter be sufficient, or might it be better to use one of the IE more efficient in any way?

Using the stock drill, collect stock ore which can be converted into HTP, is probably the easiest method. Personally, I think the stock ISRU is a bit cheaty because in order to make Liquidfuel and Oxidizer you logically need a near-surface water/ice source or you need to dig deep to collect rock which still contains hydrogen.

22 minutes ago, wkwied said:

Does this require more or less power? I imagine that using more than a single warp engine would be cumbersome on a spaceplane.

The more warp power, the less power you need to charge and travel FTL.

22 minutes ago, wkwied said:

Likewise, aside from warp mass (which looks like it is 4/8/12), is there any difference between the small/folding/large drive? They are, more or less, small/med/large drives, correct? Folding doesn't do anything the others do not do (aside from have an animation)?

1

The Folding one is more aerodynamic, the heavy (which has the higher drag) has a 50% higher warp power bonus and the small has a low diameter to base ratio.

Edit: I just noticed the folding and small warp drive are currently underpowered. warp strength of small warpdrive is supposed to be 40 while the warp strength of the folded drive should be 80. You can correct it by modifying the config file

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Using the stock drill, collect stock ore which can be converted into HTP, is probably the easiest method. Personally, I think the stock ISRU is a bit cheaty because in order to make Liquidfuel and Oxidizer you logically need a near-surface water/ice source or you need to dig deep to collect rock which still contains hydrogen.

The ISRU Fabricator doesn't seem to have the option to do the Anthraquinone process... The only options I have (it doesn't have the refinery window option) are AluminiumFiel % LqOX, and create Nuclear Saltwater

Additionally... I still need help.

I threw together a craft with the following parts: Stock drill/convertotron, all-in-one ISRU refinery, IFS Cryogenic tank set to hold HTP, a stock fuel tank set to hold only Oxidizer, and an IFS Cryogenic Dual tank set to hold only Oxidizer too.

I'm mining ore and converting it into Ox. When I try to start the Anthraquinone process, I receive the message saying missing hydrogen and oxygen.https://i.imgur.com/HLkxaBb.jpg

@FreeThinker Interesting. I didn't know that about the stock converter. I agree its a bit cheaty though. Same reason I'm trying to force myself to figure SSTO out with SKPI engines when I could just Sabre/Nuke tons of different combinations.

I did have to clip fuel tanks in all over the vessel to get enough HTP storage. So you're saying I should switch to something else for space flight. What do you recommend for fuel tanks. My biggest challenge with the other fuels is how bulky the craft has to get in order to hold a comparable amount of fuel to something like HTP in order to get the d/V necessary.

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The ISRU Fabricator doesn't seem to have the option to do the Anthraquinone process... The only options I have (it doesn't have the refinery window option) are AluminiumFiel % LqOX, and create Nuclear Saltwater

1

Sorry, I mend the ISRU Processor. It contains a context menu item called "Refinery Window" that allows the process to convert H2 + O2 into H2O2

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@kerbnub Well initially I was going to use it for powering Attila Thrusters once i reached orbit....TWR was only .1 Burns were going to take hours. Honestly I left it on there because its a test craft. The main thing its doing is providing my Magnetized Fusion reactor with its "Jump Start" Power. I could use other reactors for this but I think the Tri-Alph is one of the coolest running ones. So less heat dissipation needed. Its also running all of the other power on the ship. When I turn on all of the processors, etc. Its lifetime goes from like 1200 years to about 70 days lol. I might throw on a Helium fuel tank just in case.

@FreeThinker What changes would you recommend sir? Again my goal is to make a duna craft. Right now she's super heavy with all the fuel, which is fine I guess because she still flys good. Should I dump the Tri-Alph? Could I even get Attila's to be useful on this craft? Or do I need the charged particle generator or higher reactors to really make it worth it? Also back to my above question on fuel tanks.

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@FreeThinker What changes would you recommend sir? Again my goal is to make a duna craft. Right now she's super heavy with all the fuel, which is fine I guess because she still flys good. Should I dump the Tri-Alph? Could I even get Attila's to be useful on this craft? Or do I need the charged particle generator or higher reactors to really make it worth it? Also back to my above question on fuel tanks.

1

For the ultimate SSTO I would replace the Target Fusion Reactor by an Antimatter Initiated Micro Fusion Reactor and connect it to plasma nozzle and thermal turbojets and charged power generator

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[...] don't understand why all my indicators go off when in warp mode, as well as the nav ball becoming close to useless - there's way too little information presented in the Warp Drive info window to effectively navigate by (for me). Particularly since there are no orbits displayed even in map mode while jumping - see in screenshot, all I see is a straight line (1), even though the end result when turning off the warp drive is a curved orbit (2).

(1)

(2)

I still have the above quoted question - what is the reason for not having orbit calculations during Warp Jump?
Bug, intentional feature, or missing functionality?

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I'd be willing to say that is a limitation of the game. Warp moves your ship in the direction it is pointed, so it will say you are going in a straight line, but when you jump out, you retain the velocity and trajectory you had before you started warp

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I'd be willing to say that is a limitation of the game. Warp moves your ship in the direction it is pointed, so it will say you are going in a straight line, but when you jump out, you retain the velocity and trajectory you had before you started warp

But the game can calculate your exit orbit in realtime during a jump, at least when using a different warp mod